


Harbinger

by Patrick_Diomedes



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Dresden Files - All Media Types, The Dresden Files - Jim Butcher
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-25
Updated: 2015-04-25
Packaged: 2018-03-25 15:03:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3814849
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Patrick_Diomedes/pseuds/Patrick_Diomedes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loki realizes too late just how utterly screwed he is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Harbinger

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a brief snippet for a Dresden Files/MCU crossover that I may or may not end up continuing.

Loki of Asgard fell.

He fell for a long time, it seemed. So long that he could no longer feel the sensation of falling. There was simply the endless void in every direction. Unchanging and uncaring.

Loki wondered if this was to be his fate, consigned to nothingness for all eternity.

It was, perhaps, a kinder fate than what was often reserved for kinslayers.

 

* * *

 

 

Finally, something changed.

Loki did not know how long it had been since he fell. Time had little meaning for him now. But there was something different.

Out of the dark came…shapes. Forms that his eyes refused to focus on, sliding away from them as though they were greased. The forms grabbed him, in arms that were cold and dead and hard as stone, and they bore him away.

They threw him down before a throne, on a ragged scrap of rock, hanging in the void among others like it. His eyes were drawn, inexorably, to the throne and the being who sat upon it. His skin was the purple of a bruise, of blood beneath the skin. And even in the darkness of space, lit only by the distant fires of a nebula behind him, his golden armor gleamed like Loki’s own once had.

“What have you brought us?” Asked a voice that made Loki recoil in instinctive terror. The speaker stepped out of the shadows beside the throne, crouching down and grabbing Loki’s face in his cold, clammy hands. Hands which, Loki noted, had too many fingers. He tried to squirm away from the thing, but it was as though his body was frozen in place.

A small chuckle escaped Loki’s lips. Ironic, that. A Frost Giant, frozen in place.

Unable to get away, Loki took this chance to observe his captor. Its skin was grey and cold, and practically featureless. It had no eyes, no nose, no ears, and no hair, only a mouth. And where teeth ought to have been, there were only ridges of bone and enamel. A long tongue flicked out between those ridges, pale and wormlike, and left a trail of slime on Loki’s forehead. It chuckled darkly, and stood, turning to face its master. The thing wore no armor, only a ragged cloak that had been cut into hundreds of strips. Though there was no wind in this place, the strips of cloth stirred, constantly moving and shifting.

“An Asgardian, oh mighty Thanos. An Asgardian and a Frost Giant. There is a glamour upon him, one that is tied into his very soul.” The cloaked thing said. The being upon the throne leaned forward, letting some of the strange, sourceless light of the place fall upon his features. Loki’s eyes widened.

Thanos. He knew that name. A warlord and madman, according to Odin. The Mad Titan. He was said to be in love with Death, a love that led him to slaughter millions in deranged attempts to court her.

“Yes, I know who he is. Loki of Asgard, son of Odin himself.” Thanos said. Though he barely spoke above a whisper, the titan’s voice slammed into Loki like a hammer blow. “Speak, Asgardian. Tell us how you came to be here.”

The pressure that had been bearing down on Loki, forcing him to lay prostrate on the cold stone, vanished. Shaking, he rose to his feet, brushing the dust from his clothes as he rose. Loki bowed to the two beings, bending low at his waist and keeping his eyes on them.

“It was a simple mishap. I have discovered many pathways to other realms, pathways that are unknown anyone except myself. I was exploring a new pathway when something struck me, and I was knocked into the void. I fell until your…creatures seized me and brought me before you,” Loki said, the lies falling from his lips like water.

“You are known by many as Silvertongue, but I warn you; lie to me again and I will tear the answers to my questions from your feeble mind,” Thanos said. The pressure that had immobilized Loki before returned, slamming into his temples like spikes of fire. Loki fell to his knees, clutching his head and screaming as the psychic assault continued.

Images passed in front of his eyes.

His skin turning blue as he touched the Casket of Ancient Winters.

Odin staring down at him from the Bifrost, disgust etched in every line of his face.

Thor, glaring at him in anger such as Loki had never felt from his brother.

More and more images, slamming into him like physical blows. Malice washed over Loki like a wave, the flood of disgust and hate rising higher and higher until Loki felt he would drown in it.

And then…it stopped.

Loki gasped for air. His body had gone tense under the attack, every muscle locking in place until his back was arched, mouth open in a silent scream toward the starry sky above.

“Now, will you speak truthfully, or must I resort to more…drastic measures?” the eyeless thing asked him, the ragged strips of its cloak writhing in agitation.

“No need for that,” Loki said, carefully getting to his feet. “I—I will answer your questions.”

“Good,” Thanos said, looking away from the cloaked being. “I ask again, how did you end up here?”

“I fell from the Bifrost. It is broken. There was a fight. I lost.” Loki answered, keeping his answers concise.

“Who broke it?”

“Thor Odinson shattered the Bridge with the Mijolnir.”

“I see. And this fight was between you and he?” Thanos asked.

“Yes.”

“You will start from the beginning. You will tell us everything.”

 

* * *

 

 

Loki did. He fought against it at first, attempting to keep his own mental state at the time from his questioners. But it was no use. Every time he tried to hide something, another psychic assault came, each worse than the one before it.

The eyeless creature, he learned, was named He Who Walks Before. That name bothered him. Loki was sure he had heard the name before, likely in one of the books in Asgard’s library. But try as he might, Loki couldn’t draw that memory to the surface. And when he did manage, it was too late to do him any good.

 

* * *

 

 

Months, or perhaps even a year, had passed since Loki had been brought to “Sanctuary,” as Thanos called it. They had not been pleasant months. Once Loki had answered their questions, they had shoved him into a cage hanging above the rocky ground and left him there, only checking on him perhaps once a week. At least, Thanos and He Who Walks Before only came that often. There were…others. Others who delighted in pain and blood and screams. Their forms were twisted and wrong, all claws and jagged teeth and blazing eyes. They tormented him daily, ripping at his flesh and breaking his bones. There was some kind of sorcery worked into the bars of his cage, bars that Loki realized were made of bone. The cage healed him, repairing his body so that it could be broken again.

When the cage was opened, Loki fell to the ground, crying out in agony as one of his legs broke. Bone poked through the skin of his calf, blood dripping from the holes. But the cage’s magic was swift, his leg healing within the span of a couple minutes.

Loki struggled to his feet, unused to being able to stand up all the way after being stuck in that cramped cage for what seemed like eons. He Who Walks Before stood before him, arms folded across its chest.

“Come, Asgardian,” it said, and began walking away. Loki dashed after the creature, his long legs carrying him across the distance in a few strides.

“Where are you taking me?” Loki asked. It was pointless to try and discern his location. All these asteroids were practically identical, and there was a glamour upon them that wreaked havoc with the mind’s sense of direction.

“Thanos has a task for you,” it replied.

“I see,” Loki said. After a few minutes of walking in silence, he asked a question that had been on his mind since their first encounter. “If you don’t mind me asking, what exactly  _are_  you? I have heard of nothing like you in any of the Nine Realms, or beyond.”

In lieu of an answer, a psychic impression slammed into Loki, driving him to his knees yet again.

It was an onrushing wave of malice, of hate so ancient and vile and deep that it could have stopped his heart with that alone. There was no mercy to be had from this force. It despised everything, from the smallest vermin to the Mad Titan himself. Nothing could stand before this thing. It was a storm, rushing across the land and pulverizing everything in its path to dust.

And then the feeling was gone. Loki could still feel wisps of it, though. And as he stood, he realized that He Who Walks Before had been keeping its presence suppressed somehow. That had been its full presence, its very essence. He Who Walks Before was not just a strange title. It was who this thing was. The harbinger of the end of everything.

And at last, the memory that had been at the edge of Loki’s consciousness since first hearing its name surfaced, like a corpse that had been dropped in a lake long ago and was now borne to the surface by the putrid gasses and bloating.

It had been a very old text on magic, written by a Midgardian of all things.

_“Of all the creatures that dwell beyond the realm of the purely physical, none are as inimical to life as the Outsiders. If they have a name for themselves it has long been forgotten. They are the servants of the Old Ones, who ruled our world in a time before living memory. They were banished with their masters, trapped Outside of reality itself. But they seek to return, and will take any opportunity to walk the mortal world once again. Only the magic of a mortal may summon them. Once these abominations have been summoned, they are nigh impossible to strike down. Magic does them little harm, and physical weapons even less._  
  


_“Chief among them are beings known as Walkers, who command the armies that constantly seek entrance to the world that was once theirs._  
  


_“It is for this reason that I have set in place the Seventh Law: Thou Shalt Not Seek Beyond The Outer Gates. Even more than the other Laws, this one must be mercilessly enforced. I have seen the Gates, seen the endless battles waged before them. If they should fall, then nothing will be spared.”_

Loki followed the Walker, silently cursing himself. Helping this creature would be to sign the universe’s death sentence. But he knew that a refusal would lead to torments so horrific that what they had done to him as he hung in the cage would seem like a gentle massage in comparison.


End file.
